Which cases should be chosen to be observed for the better understanding of law status and improvement of law enforcement? The cases which might influence legislation and justice or the social pendulum, which might ruffle the peace of the public or which are controversial and full of conflicts have become our focus of attention. We define those cases as “the impact litigation”.

The impact litigation may be prominent cases or famous cases. But not all prominent cases or famous cases are impact litigation. Some cases may become impact litigation due to their titles, the intricate plots, the good timing, the famous parties, the complicated legal relations, the attention from the superior or even the great promotion skills. However, if the case deviated from the main purpose of “impact litigation”, which is to promote the law enforcement through the individual cases, it would not make the impact litigation.

The research of impact litigation draws on the techniques of the case analysis of Law Department. But they are widely different from the simple case analysis, which only attaches importance to law regulations and classical law theories in the analysis of cases, regardless of who is involved in the case, when or where the case happens or under what historical background it happens, let alone who should judge it or what factors contribute to the decision-making by the judges or what effects the verdict might bring.

We expect that more specialists in law would pay attention to and participate in actively the impact litigation research. But there are great differences between the case analysis and the influential case research. In the case analysis, the specialists in law can go way beyond the individual cases after generalizing the problems from them. On the contrary, the influential case research begins with the individual cases, and ends with them. It is the aim of the impact litigation to bring the legal solution to the individual lawsuits and the similar cases.

Media is an important factor in these impact litigation. And only in the Internet Age can the physical condition required for influential lawsuits be met. Although they also aim to promote law awareness, the impact litigation researches are widely different from the news coverage of the cases and legal propaganda. Instead of attracting attention from the public or playing a role of instructor, impact litigation seek to observe how the legal parties claim their legal rights, and do researches upon the relationship between the individual cases and the development of nomocracy.